Luca Zaccarian

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on May 25, 2015

Miscellaneous

Latex Links

 

A few useful line commands in Linux

 

  • Remove comments from a latex source:
    grep -v '^%' filename.tex > newfile.tex
  • Merge multiple .jpg images into a single pdf:
    convert `ls -v *.jpg` foobar.pdf
  • Generate reduced versions of all .jpg images and put them in a subfolder:
    for i in *.jpg; do convert "$i" -resize 640x640 "small/${i%%.jpg*}.jpg"; done
  • Convert a matlab .pdf figure into an ipe-editable pdf: (see also https://github.com/otfried/ipe-wiki/wiki/Matlab)
    pdftoipe input.pdf tmp.xml
    ipetoipe -pdf tmp.xml output.pdf
    rm tmp.xml
  • Convert to pdf all eps files in the current folder:
    for file in *.eps ; do epstopdf $file `echo --outfile=pdfs/$file | sed 's/\(.*\.\)eps/\1pdf/'` ; done
  • Rename all *.pdf files in the current folder into *.PDF:
    for file in *.pdf ; do mv $file `echo $file | sed 's/\(.*\.\)pdf/\1PDF/'` ; done
  • Reduce the size of a pdf file (see also this thread):
    gs -sDEVICE=pdfwrite -dCompatibilityLevel=1.4 -dPDFSETTINGS=/screen -dNOPAUSE -dQUIET -dBATCH -sOutputFile=output.pdf input.pdf
  • Resize a pdf file:
    convert input.pdf -resize 1920x1200! output.pdf
  • Crop all pages of a pdf file:
    pdfcrop --margins '5 10 20 30' input.pdf output.pdf
  • Reshuffle a pdf file in booklet order and put two pages per sheet
    pdfbook input.pdf
    (output is written to input-book.pdf)
  • Convert a GIF video into mp4:
    ffmpeg -i animated.gif -movflags faststart -pix_fmt yuv420p -vf "scale=trunc(iw/2)*2:trunc(ih/2)*2" video.mp4
  • Trimming an mp4 file to cut useless stuff:
    ffmpeg -i input_file.mp4 -ss 13:00 -c copy -to 51:00 output_file.mp4
  • Slighly rotate an mp4 file:
    ffmpeg -i input.mp4 -vf "rotate=-0.02" output.mp4
  • Rotate an mp4 file counter-clockwise by 90 degrees:
    ffmpeg -i 3_RED.mp4 -vf "transpose=2" output_3.mp4
  • Crop an mp4 file:
    ffmpeg -i input.mp4 -filter:v "crop=iw:ih*2/5:0:ih*2/5" output.mp4
  • Speed up an mp4 file by making it 0.88 times its original length:
    ffmpeg -i input_file.mp4 -filter_complex "[0:v]setpts=0.88*PTS[v];[0:a]atempo=1/0.88[a]" -map "[v]" -map "[a]" output_file.mp4
  • Several commands to perform pdf manipulations with pdftk

Matlab/Simulink Links

 

Mathematical aids

 

Writing a Paper, a Report or a Thesis

 

  • Download here a latex template for writing a thesis (in Italian). The template contains several suggestions about how to write your MS thesis. You may also download the pdf file resulting from compiling the soures in the zip file. This is an old template from the Unviersity of Rome. You may download here a new template from the University of Trento.
  • Download here a document written by Joao Hespanha (UCSB) with some fundamental indications about how to structure a control paper.
  • Download here a handbook on Mathematical writing, written by Burce Francis. Check out the last chapter about giving a presentation using computer slides.
  • Download here an interesting document from "San Francisco Edit" with some suggestions about how to start writing a scientific paper.

Presenting your work

 

  • Check out here the slides/suggestions proposed by former CSS president Y. Yamamoto.
  • Download here a list of suggestions in Italian about how to prepare your slides.
  • www.prezi.com a very effective web-based software for preparing your slides.

Scientific Resources (useful to access/search papers)

 

Online courses and seminars